


If I Fall Forward, You Fall Flat

by boo_cool_robot



Category: Friends at the Table (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Bodyguard, Canon-Typical Violence, F/F, Hieron Universe, M/M, Secret Samol 2019, Sharing bread as romantic gesture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-13
Updated: 2020-01-13
Packaged: 2021-02-27 08:09:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22233832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/boo_cool_robot/pseuds/boo_cool_robot
Summary: Despite Adaire hiring Hella Varal, best mercenary reasonable money could buy, to protect her person, she draws the line at being carried.
Relationships: Adaire Ducarte/Hella Varal, Hadrian/Samot (Friends at the Table)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 14
Collections: Secret Samol 2019





	If I Fall Forward, You Fall Flat

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ringingglass](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ringingglass/gifts).



> Hopefully this is an exasperated enough of a bodyguard AU for you, Juliet! Happy new year!
> 
> Uh, I feel like I should note that I am actually very fond of both Hadrian and Samot....however, Adaire is not. 
> 
> Thanks to imperialhare for looking over a draft of this! All credit for "Tomas" being Samot's paper-thin alias goes to Danny Suedeuxnim. 
> 
> Fic title from "C'mon" by fun. and Panic! at the Disco.

“Are you sure you don’t want to let me carry you?”

Hella’s fingers felt warm where they curled around Adaire’s shoulder. Adaire shrugged her hand off and resumed picking her way across the rocks.

“I can handle it,” Adaire responded in her best calm, of-course-I’m-supposed-to-be-here voice. 

A sigh, one that practically brushed the back of Adaire’s neck. “You hired us to keep you safe.” Hella was still hovering closely.

“You’re keeping my maps and my medicines safe by carrying them, and that’s what’s important,” she lied. The real goods were sewn into the lining of her skirts, which she drew up to avoid dipping into the stream. She had learned the hard way to keep everything important within a hand’s breadth. 

If only Hella Varal, best mercenary reasonable money could buy, hadn’t seemed to decide the same thing about her. 

Frankly though, she would also have settled for not having to hire the other best mercenary reasonable money could buy. 

“Tomas is letting Hadrian carry him,” Hella continued in what was probably supposed to be a cajoling tone, but just sounded puppyish. She reached around Adaire to point a little ways downstream, where the rich blond idiot that Adaire had somehow ended up being herded around by Two Friends Adventurers alongside was indeed cradled in the arms of Velas’s apparent number two mercenary. Hadrian had practically carried him the whole journey so far even though the guy was obviously suspicious. Tomas was about as real a name as Ducarte was, Adaire suspected. Hadrian was a fool.

Adaire would rather drown than be carried by a sweaty church boy like him.

“I’d rather drown than be carried by a sweaty church boy like him,” she informed Hella, valiantly ignoring the closeness of her lean muscles. 

Hella sighed, but Adaire thought she could detect a slight smile on her face. “Don’t be so mean to Hadrian. He’s a good guy.” 

So far, he’d proven himself to be good at very little save entertaining Tomas. Adaire very tactfully did not voice her thoughts for Hella’s sake. 

When Adaire had first researched Two Friends, she had wondered how people with such different backgrounds had gone into business together. Perhaps Hella had some kind of leverage on Hadrian, she’d thought. Now that she’d met them, Adaire realized that it really had to be the other way around considering how irritating Hadrian seemed to be. 

Nonetheless, Adaire conceded. “Sure,” she said with audible insincerity. 

She fumbled at her belt pouch for something to take the mild exasperation in Hella’s voice away. It wouldn’t do to have her guard actually become angry at her, after all, she argued with no one in particular. It was only practical. “Here, have this bread.” She thrust a fluffy seed roll, the last on her, at Hella. 

Hella grinned at her, teeth brilliant against her dark skin. “Thanks, I’ll take it to Hadrian right now!” 

“Well--” was all that she was able to get out before Hella’s long legs propelled her to Hadrian and Tomas faster than Adaire could catch up. 

“Hadrian really appreciates your apology,” Hella said after she bounded back to Adaire’s side. She walked a few steps ahead of her this time, seemingly trusting Adaire not to slip into the barely knee-deep creek and perish after all. 

“Uh huh.” Adaire could clearly see that Hadrian was probably not thinking much about her at all considering that he had somehow found himself subject to Tomas feeding him bites of the roll and dusting crumbs out of the white fur cloak that Tomas had draped over him earlier for alleged “safekeeping.” Hadrian caught her glare and visibly blanched behind Hella’s back. Good. “I have better bread for you once we make camp.” 

“But we’re already cool.” Hella turned around to look at her, stride momentarily arrested. “You know that we’re cool, right, Adaire?” 

“...Yeah.” She felt unreasonably warm at hearing that from someone she’d only met four days ago. “We’re totally cool. I just don’t want my bread to go bad.” 

Hella shrugged and dipped her head, smirking slightly. Adaire very carefully tamped down a blush.

They had only taken a few more slow steps across slippery stone when a muffled shout came from Hadrian and Tomas. Adaire, figuring that Hadrian had been startled by Tomas’s fingers finally making it all the way inside his mouth or something of that nature, continued walking. Hella, more concerned about Hadrian making loud noises for some reason, turned to look. Adaire, watching her leg muscles flex as she walked behind her, saw when Hella’s boot came down on a crumbling edge of stone just a few strides from the riverbank. 

“Watch out!” Adaire tried not to shout, but failed. At the same time, she found herself reaching out to grab Hella, one hand under her elbow and the other at her hip. Her shoulder twisted automatically against Hella’s broad back, bracing her to compensate for the height difference. Her entire front felt warm pressed up against Hella. She barely registered that her own right leg was now in the stream. 

“Guess you didn’t need me to catch you,” Hella chuckled. Her braid brushed Adaire’s cheek, and she shivered. 

This was why she hadn’t wanted Hella to carry her. She couldn’t afford this, the breathless feeling of Hella’s warmth against her. But somehow, in that moment, it felt good to make Hella laugh.

That, of course, was when they got attacked. 

“Get behind me!” she heard Hadrian call, and then the ring of steel on steel. Adaire whirled toward the sound of battle, hand on her belt of throwing knives. 

“Adaire, run!” Hella hissed. Before Adaire could protest, Hella scooped her up by the armpits and set her on the riverbank, dropping her bag of maps in her arms. “I think they’re after Tomas.” 

Of course they were. She cursed under her breath. 

A few figures in cloaks broke away from where they were attacking Hadrian and seemed to notice Hella. Adaire scrambled back, dropping the bag and clutching her skirts. 

Hella drew her sword with a roar and dove into the melee, bursting through the pack of attackers and slashing a wide arc against a tall person drawing a dagger on Hadrian. The rubies on her sword’s pommel glinted blood red in the afternoon sun. Audible gasps rose. 

Adaire backed away slowly, keeping her eye on all the assailants. One, two, three circling Hella in the shallows of the river. Another two trying to snatch at Tomas behind Hadrian. Five total, all in hooded cloaks displaying no emblems. The odds were bad considering Tomas couldn’t fight. 

She should do as Hella said and run. She could try and meet the rest of the party later, or not. Whatever nonsense Tomas was mixed up in had nothing to do with her, and if there was anything Adaire excelled at, it was minding her own business when it came down to it. 

But--

Oh, she had been wrong. 

Out of the corner of her she saw a sixth figure rise from a crouch. She must have missed them earlier among the melee. Foolish. Their hands glowed as they stalked toward--

Toward Hella.

Adaire felt herself unsheath her throwing knives from her belt and volley them toward the attacker without a conscious decision from her mind. Fruitless. All of them fell well before reaching their target. She had little else on her person. Most of her strategy for winning fights was to avoid them in the first place through traps and tricks. Perhaps she’d have to reevaluate that policy for the future if she made it through the next while. 

Nothing left but herself. Nothing for it. 

She charged. 

“Hey asshole!” she screamed, splashing through the water as loudly as she could. Had to buy Hella a moment to push back her attackers before Glowy Hands could grab her. Had to dart in close before anyone could react. Feel for the hip, a curl of her fingers, a push of her palm--

The dagger she palmed sunk home true. Glowy Hands staggered back with a look of shock, clutching their abdomen, greenish blood seeping from between their fingers. 

“Adaire,” Hella gasped. Her deep brown eyes were wide. 

“Yep.” Adaire held the dagger in front of herself, suddenly feeling like she could fend off a dozen weirdo cultists. She had a grin stretched across her face, she was pretty sure. “I’m here.” 

“No, Adaire, get down!” And then Hella tackled her. 

She found herself in Hella’s arms, both of them falling, falling. Shouts rang out. The hairs on the back of her neck stood up. Above them, a blast of purple energy crackled, and all sound left for a moment.

When it returned, her back was wet, and she was still in Hella’s arms. 

“Are you okay?” Hella asked, her voice unbearably gentle. Her face was close above her, her forearms clutched below Adaire’s head to cushion it from river stone. Adaire was pinned beneath her, the only thing she could see Hella’s face and a curtain of red curls that must have come loose during the fight. Somewhere behind them, shouts turned to screams, and some kind of animal had started snarling, she distantly registered.

“I’m always okay.” Adaire snaked her arm up to pat up and down Hella’s back. She seemed whole and warm and alive. 

Hella huffed out a breath. It tickled her cheek. “It’s my job to keep you safe, you know.” Somehow, she didn’t sound too angry. 

“You did wonderfully,” Adaire assured her. “I’m sure you’ll keep doing wonderfully.” 

Hella raised an eyebrow at her. “Are you planning on getting into more trouble?”

“Absolutely. Just watch.” 

Despite her words, nothing felt safer than leaning up and touching her lips to Hella’s. 

After a few long moments, Hella broke their kiss and grinned at her. Propped herself back up on her arms and stood, holding a hand out to pull Adaire up onto steady ground. She took it. 

Adaire looked warily at the boys a few yards away, ready to deliver a cutting remark if they said a single ridiculous word, but they seemed preoccupied with other matters. Tomas was fussing over Hadrian, dabbing at blood on his face that seemed to be gluing his eyes shut, if Hadrian’s protesting grunts were any indication. Tomas himself, the source of all the preceding trouble, seemed totally unruffled, save for his expensive-looking white robe hanging in tatters around him and a small trail of red running from the corner of his mouth. 

She shivered. The air had suddenly turned cold. Despite the lack of clouds, she could swear a snowflake had landed on her cheek. 

Hella put her arm around her and pulled her close. “How about we all get out of here and make camp for the night, scrounge up some snacks?” 

Adaire brushed at her skirts. The contracts sewn into the lining of her petticoats must have dissolved in the river, she realized. She ignored them. She could always figure something else out. 

“Yeah,” she said. “I promised you some nice bread. Let’s go.” Adaire tucked her arm into Hella’s and let herself be supported as they walked on together. 


End file.
